Medical clinic owner sentenced for fraud scheme

The owner of four now-defunct Family Medical Center clinics was sentenced today to one year and one day in prison for health care fraud.

Michael Tucker, 47, of Springfield, also was ordered to pay $54,273 in restitution, according to a news release from the office of Tammy Dickinson, U.S. attorney for the Western District of Missouri.

He pleaded guilty in March to health care fraud related to Medicaid and Medicare. Tucker operated Family Medical Center clinics in Branson, Carthage, Nevada and Lamar until June 2015, when he closed them and Family Medical Center ceased doing business.

In his guilty plea, Tucker admitted he defrauded Medicaid and Medicare by submitting claims to the government for more expensive treatments than were actually provided at his clinics. The clinics’ physicians and nurse practitioners accurately recorded the services provided and were unaware of Tucker later manipulating the data, according to the release.

The Medicaid scheme lasted Jan. 1, 2014-June 30, 2014, and the Medicare scheme occurred April 15, 2013-Sept. 24, 2014.

To accomplish the scheme, Tucker billed Medicaid and Medicare for the services of a physician when the patient was actually seen by a nurse practitioner, and he billed Medicaid for physician office visits when only laboratory services had been provided, among other illegal billing practices, according to the release.